414 Transactions of the South African Philosophical Society. 



Inquiries from the natives (Bechuanas) could not elicit any 

 information. They had no idea by whom these semicircles were 

 built. Their history was unknown ; they were in existence longer 

 than their forefathers remembered. 



To those who know the impossibility of obtaining an idea of 

 chronology from a Bantu beyond a few generations, the ignorance of 

 the occupiers of that part of the country is in no way remarkable. 

 But the Eev. Mojffat, than whom no one knows the Bechuanas better, 

 is said by Stow {loc. cit., p. 27) to " have ascribed these productions to 

 the Bechuanas, and employs their existence as an evidence of the 

 extended occupation of his favoured tribe in early days ! H 



informs us that they are called Lokualo, a word from which the one 

 used to express writing and printing is derived. He further states in 

 describing those which he examined, that these Lokualo are various 

 figures chipped upon stones with flat surfaces. These marks, the 

 Eev. Moffat says, are made by striking one stone on another till 

 curved lines, circles, ovals, and zigzag figures are impressed upon its 

 surface, exhibiting the appearance of a white stripe of about an inch 

 broad, hke a confused coil of rope. These, the Rev. Moffat imagined, 

 were done by Bechuana herd-boys, &c." 



Of course Stow, following his favourite theme, pronounces Mr. 

 Moffat to be " clearly mistaken, for there can be no question but 

 that these relics are all of undoubted Bushman origin." 



